The work of local artist Carolina de la Cajiga has been selected to be part of a prestigious art exhibition highlighting contemporary Islamic works selected by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  

Curated by Dr. Maryam Ekhtiar, a scholar in Persian art and culture and the associate curator of Islamic art at the Met, the fifth annual Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Islamic Art will showcase works inspired by Islamic art, literature, and architecture, and will feature work in a variety of mediums and styles. 

Artists participating in the exhibit come from diverse backgrounds with varying faiths, ages, and levels of expertise, illustrating that Islamic art can be a way to connect individuals across generations and cultures. 

The only Canadian to be selected to participate in the international exhibition, de la Cajiga is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice is an amalgamation of photography, painting, sculpture, and new technology.

A contemporary take on traditional geometric Islamic designs, her work Aliya has been selected to be part of the exhibit, which will take place this fall at the Irving Arts Center in Texas. 

Selected for its ability convey serenity and equilibrium, Aliya both invigorates and tranquilizes the mind, leading to deep thinking and meditation. 

"As an archeologist delicately brushes away the dust surrounding a found object, I carefully remove the photographic noise in my shots of extremely fast moving light, searching for hidden gems," says the artist in a statement about her work. 

"I radically reduce or amplify elements in the original capture to leave only what my mind sees. The result is symmetrical or asymmetrical renderings which show a tension between static and dynamic forces," de la Cajiga says of the process.

Taking it a step further, de la Cajiga has coined the term "Katharography" as a way to describe her artistic process, by combining the Greek word katharós, meaning "to clean", with the word graphy, meaning "to illustrate". 

Presented in part with the Islamic Arts Revival Series, the exhibit will take place  at the Irving Arts Centerfrom September 17 and November 13.